Warnings: moderate violence, and discussion of abuse within a romantic relationship.

Given that the latter may be triggering/upsetting for some, I'm going to put a tiny summary of Theo and Missy's explanation for those who would prefer to not read it at the end of chapter notes.

(Also, Brian = Roberts!Master, if it isn't clear.)

Bill can't breathe.

Next to her, Theo has frozen completely and Missy has a hand on his arm, gripping it so tightly her knuckles are white. River is stone, staring at Saxon with a hard, unreadable expression. Nardole's eyes are nervously darting between everyone.

"Get out," Bill says, without even entirely meaning to, taking a step towards him. She's the closest by several feet, and her heart is pounding but she doesn't think it is out of fear for herself.

"Bill," Theo says, voice thick with worry.

Saxon just laughs. "She's plucky. And almost cute. Seems a bit boring though, doesn't she? Then again, you all seem a bit boring now. I saw that picture on Instagram. Cuddle piles in a blanket fort? Really?"

"Leave," River says, voice low and more dangerous than Bill has ever heard it. Her eyes are burning with a loathing so powerful that Bill almost can't look at it. "Walk out of this tent, never show your face in front of us again, and I'll consider letting you do so with your face intact."

Saxon lifts a singular eyebrow at her. Then he looks at Theo, seeming vaguely amused.

"Is this what it's come to? Hiding behind your woman?" He looks to Missy and sneers. "Or someone else's woman? I remember when the two of you were hard enough to hold me down and shove a burning cigarette into my ankle, but look at you now, you're pathetic -ah!"

There's a blur of motion and a crack. It takes Bill a moment to work out what exactly has happened. Saxon is on the ground and yelling and something is on top of him and also yelling or something -

It's River. Moving with more speed than Bill had even realised she possessed, River had leapt from her seat and tackled him to the ground.

Now, she's on top of him punching him with everything she has, her face twisted with a horrible fury.

"River! No!" Theo shouts.

But he doesn't move. Bill isn't sure he can. Missy has a white knuckled grip on his arm and he seems paralysed with fear regardless.

Saxon grins up at River, eyes fierce and alive and sadistic. "Oh, I've been waiting for a chance to do this."

His fist swings to hit River right back, square in the jaw. She makes a noise of pain, but a much milder one than Bill had expected from such a hit. Louder is the noise of distress that Theo makes in the back of his throat. Missy is just sitting there, watching the entire brawl with an unreadable expression. Her whole body is rigid.

River doesn't even falter. Her assault continues, and Saxon holds nothing back in his reciprocation.

Bill wants to step in, but doesn't, and isn't sure she quite has the guts to do so. She might need to jump in front of Theo and Missy instead, should something go awry, anyway.

"You think you've been waiting?" River growls at Saxon. "I've been waiting more than thirteen years for the chance to hit you where it hurts, you vile little cockroach of a man." She holds back a yelp when he grabs her hair and yanks on it, but still doesn't waver when it comes to her next punch, and she grins through a bloody mouth when he groans with pain. "If I could, I would remove every one of your-"

"What the - oh Jesus-"

Jack has just appeared in the entrance of the tent, his whole face going pale at the sight before him.

Like the dashing action hero he looks the part of, he rushes forward and yanks River and Saxon apart, pulling them to their feet. River, he pushes towards Theo and Missy, the former of whom finally unfreezes and grabs River on instinct.

Saxon, however, is kept tight in his grasp.

"Oh look, the man whore finally saw past the oh-so-easy distraction," Saxon says with a grin. It's even more sinister because his nose looks like it's broken and there's blood pouring from it, and he doesn't seem remotely worried.

Jack grits his teeth. "Okay, I was debating the matter of professionalism, but fuck it."

He slams his fist into Saxon's face, sending him staggering back, and making him laugh even as he spits out blood. Jack steps forward and hits him again, this time in the gut, and River twitches where she's now half in Theo's arms. Her hair is a mess even in her ponytail and there's blood around her mouth, but it's obvious she's itching to join back in.

"Jack, stop it," Theo says tightly. "Let him go."

Jack reluctantly releases Saxon, shoving him in the direction of the tent entrance, where he collides with an unfamiliar figure who has approached it.

"Sorry, boss, I'm good, but even I can't distract such a fine gentleman from his job when there's an obvious throwdown going on," the unknown man says to Saxon with a grin. "Worked for a while though, it wasn't a bad plan."

"And what help were you otherwise?" Saxon snaps.

The man is American and has slicked back brown hair, aviators, and a long leather coat surely too hot for this weather. He seems unperturbed by Saxon's attitude and merely shrugs.

"You told me to distract the pretty boy. I did. You didn't say anything about stopping you from getting your ass kicked."

"You are literally my bodyguard, Brian," Saxon snaps. "What is the point of you, if not that?"

Brian shrugs again. It's odd for Bill, after everything, to see someone act so nonchalantly around Saxon. "To tell you that it's time we left, since everyone in this tent looks like they literally want to murder you?" he says with exasperation. "What did you do, anyway?"

Saxon rolls his eyes and straightens his clothing. "Shut up and find me a handkerchief or some tissues or something."

"Yes sir," Brian says, a bit mockingly, before leaving.

Saxon turns back to the others, eyes flashing, a sneer curling his lips. "Well, this has been fun."

Theo steps forward, shaking off Missy and River's hands when they try to stop him. "Don't you dare come near my family again. We're finished. Move on."

"You don't get to decide when we're finished. I do," Saxon replies, and he reaches out to grab Theo's shirt and pull him closer until they're less than a foot apart, and Bill jumps in front of River and Missy as a precaution since she can't get in front of Theo in time.

Theo stares Saxon down, jaw tense, eyes burning with that fierce bravery Bill has always known him to have. It occurs to Bill that she has no idea what Theo is like in a fight, his ability to beautifully deck racists not withstanding. It's so hard to imagine him in one, and yet, here they all are. Watching. Waiting.

But Saxon doesn't hit him. Saxon pulls him into a hard, unforgiving kiss, and Bill swears for a second that Theo kisses him back, just for a moment, before going rigid.

Luckily, that's when Jack yanks Saxon away and throws him out of the tent. Bill can hear the sick fuck laughing as he finally leaves.

Theo turns around, slowly, only seeming half aware of his surroundings. There's a smear of blood on his upper lip that must have come from Saxon's nose.

"Thete-" Missy tries to say, voice tiny and choked.

He doesn't seem to hear her. It isn't until he looks at River that he seems to come back to himself.

"Why did you do that?!" he demands, striding up to her, his hand going to her face while the other pulls out a handkerchief and starts cleaning her mouth with it. The beginnings of a black eye are beginning to show on the left side of River's face.

"Because I've been waiting thirteen years to hurt that man," River says, breathing hard.

"But he hurt you-"

"No, he didn't, not really," River assures him. "This is nothing. It was worth it."

"No, it wasn't," Theo says, getting more and more worked up. "Nothing is worth me having to stand by and watch while he hurts someone I care about, again!"

Missy bites her lip, her gaze torn between him and the ground, evermoving.

"But sweetie, I'm fine, really," River says. "I could take it, easily!"

"Well I can't!"

Theo's voice breaks, and Bill realises just how much his body is shaking. Tears have welled up in his eyes, and she can only watch in horror as he crumbles to the ground before his wife, burying his face against the front of her legs as he clutches at them, sobs starting to wrack his body.

River drops a moment later, pulling his head into her lap and stroking his hair, tears silently falling down her cheeks. He clutches at her like a drowning man to a liferaft.

"So that's what it took," Missy murmurs.

"What the hell just happened?" Nardole asks. "Did I dream all of this? Or did an actual fight just happen in our tent and is Theo actually properly crying right now?"

Bill feels a lump in her throat. "No, this is real," she says, feeling something ugly in her chest, something angry and hateful that is so unfamiliar to her and feels so wrong. "And I might not know what the hell he did but I've seen what he's just done and if he comes near us again, I'm going to deck him."

"We'll tell you."

Bill, Nardole and River all turn to look at Missy, who had been the one to speak. Missy is staring ahead, the way she does when it looks like she's seeing something that isn't there, or purposefully seeing nothing at all.

"What?"

"Once he's alright," Missy says, glancing at Theo and swallowing. "If he agrees. We'll tell you what he did. We need to… we need to try and talk about it. And I think he's finally stopped denying the past."

Theo isn't crying anymore. He is, however, unmoving but for his shaking form, still clinging to River like a lifeline.

It makes Bill feel sick to her stomach to see him like this, but she doesn't know how to make it better. She doesn't know if it's even possible to do so.

"I'm going to find Clara and tell her to cancel the meet and greets," Bill says, numbly.

Missy's eyes snap to her with alarm. "But your girl-"

"That isn't important now," Bill forces herself to say, and half believes it, "and seriously, Missy, do you think any of us are in a state to see anyone right now?"

"... no. No, of course," Missy says. "You're right. Go on."

Bill calls Clara and feels like she can physically feel her Star Girl slipping from her fingertips as she does so. But as she looks around at her friends, three of them without dry eyes and Nardole simply awkward and worried beyond belief, she knows it's the only way forward.

Once back in the tour bus, Theo and Missy retreat to the latter's room for a while. Bill and Nardole sit on the sofa while River makes tea and then sits at the table, staring at her cup like it will give her some kind of answer.

"You okay?" Bill asks. "I know you gave more than you got, but that was still one hell of a beating."

"I'm fine, physically at least," River says.

"And… not physically?"

"What do you think?" River replies, voice hollow. "I've dreamt of getting to do that for years. And now I can't even remember it with pride because all I'll see is my husband being assaulted right in front of me. My husband crying into me. And all I can think is that I've been so focused on my revenge that I never thought about the possibility of Theo being there. Of how any of it might hurt him."

"But it was all for him, wasn't it? Your revenge, you wanted it because of how he'd been hurt in the first place," Nardole says.

River gives a weak half smile. "I suppose. I just… thought this would feel more like a victory. But it isn't. It was never going to be. Stupid of me."

"Yes, stupid of you," Theo agrees from the doorway of Missy's room, eyeing her with that fierce love that Bill never gets tired of seeing. He approaches her and bends to kiss the top of her head. "Also reckless, and brave, and brilliant."

River swallows, eyes closing at the brush of his lips against her hair, just for a moment.

"It wasn't incredibly reckless, really, I can handle myself-"

"Are you trying to imply Missy can't? Being able to handle yourself has nothing to do with it," Theo says sharply, and River quietens at that.

"Speaking of Missy, where's she going?" Bill asks.

"To get Clara and Ashildr and Jack," Theo explains. "They need to hear this too." He locks his jaw. "We… we're not sure we'll be able to say it more than once."

Bill nods, and then gets up and hugs him, for lack of anything better to do. He hugs her back tightly, murmuring a thank you, and then hugs Nardole when he joins in. It's soothing, not just physically but in a deeper part of Bill's heart (or soul, or whatever it is).

When they let go, Theo looks at River. He touches her chin for a moment.

"Please don't ever do that again," he asks, tightly. "You can't go after him like that-"

River looks at him sadly. "I can't make that promise, my love."

He sighs, the look on his face saying he ought to have known better than to ask, which at any time would be adorable and hilarious to Bill but right now just makes her chest ache even more. He sits at the table so that he's opposite River, and steals some of her tea.

It isn't long before Missy returns with Clara, Ashildr and Jack at her side.

"Right, everyone get comfortable, it's Tragic Backstory with Theo and Missy time," Missy tells everyone as she squeezes in next to Theo at the table and then crosses her arms as she waits for everyone to comply.

The others sit down where there's room on the sofa, Jack taking the singular recliner opposite.

"So, you know our story, best friends forever from the age of eight, whatever, all very cute," Missy says. "Anyway, so we decide to go to university together, and study science like the nerds we are. We get physics degrees but then decide that most physics jobs are pants and go for music instead. As you can imagine, our upper class parents were thrilled. But anyway, we're twenty four and for the last few years I've been doing piano lessons and Thete's been doing guitar lessons and we're half living off family money but that's fine. Enter Harry Saxon. Charming, good looking, and a natural at virtually any instrument he picks up."

"He was wanting to start a band," Theo says. "He had ambition like you'd never seen. Always talked about wanting to rule the world."

Missy is somewhat somber now. "He understood me like no one ever had, not even Thete," she murmurs, "every dark little part of myself I'd tried to deny, or that Thete had discouraged, he understood without even trying. He encouraged me to be myself, properly. In the process, I fell madly in love with him. Of course, I was also madly in love with Thete, but that didn't matter."

"So you dated both of them?" Clara asks. "Saxon doesn't seem like the sharing type."

Missy looks at Theo, who coughs.

"She wasn't the only one who fell for him," Theo says slowly, drawing a hand over his face. "He was…. hypnotic. There was just something about him, I don't know. He was mad and wild and so fucking alive. Made us feel like that too. Both of us."

"Oh," Bill says, realising what he means. How had she never considered that? Somehow, in the haze of everything, she'd not thought about Saxon's kissing Theo as anything more than another aggressive tactic. "So… the three of you, then."

"Yes, the three of us," Theo confirms.

"Anyway, we became an unstoppable force of nature, the three of us," Missy continues, waving her hand dismissively. "Made a band, got successful, felt like we were on top of the fucking world. And it was brilliant, it really was. We were reckless idiots who would play a show, go back to our hotel and get high off our faces, and fuck until morning."

Theo stares at the table in front of him, expression as unfathomable as ever. "It was brilliant until it wasn't."

Missy is quieter now, not just her voice but her eyes as well, and her jaw tense. "Yeah."

"He hurt you, didn't he?" Jack asks, looking at Missy. "Was it... both of you?"

"In retrospect, it started long before anything got physical," Missy says slowly, all at once looking incredibly tired, dragging a hand across her face. "Jealousy, if we so much as looked at anyone else, if we gave outsiders too much of our time."

"Every single time he told you that he was the only one that would ever understand you," Theo says through gritted teeth, his fist clenched. "You still believe it, you still say it."

Missy doesn't deny it, she just swallows and moves on.

"Anyway. That sort of thing. Classic warning signs." She shrugs minutely, her eyes not quite looking at them, distant. "Shouting, lack of genuine apologies, not taking enough care with certain things in the bedroom, you know. And then it was more than that, shoving and grabbing and throwing things until one day - well. I fired my makeup artist and started doing my own so I could cover the bruises."

The whole bus is silent. Bill has too much going on in her body and mind to know what to say or feel, other than anger and disgust and pain.

One thing does come out, though.

"The cigarette burn," she says slowly, looking at Theo. "You made it sound like you guys did it for fun."

"It was fun to give him one," Missy says darkly. "But no, however he managed to spin it to you, it was not."

Theo's eyes flash with a flicker of intense pain, but he doesn't look at or touch the spot on his arm where he has the burn scar. He is looking at Missy's leg, where Bill knows that Missy's own scar is located.

"You know, even now, I doubt there's much if any literature on abuse in polyamorous relationships," Theo says quietly. "In the late nineties? Definitely nothing of the sort. Maybe in some scenarios, it would easier to get out, with two. I don't know. But it was the opposite for us."

River has evidently heard all of this before, and is tearing up her napkin with badly restrained rage, her jaw tight.

"How was it worse, exactly?" Nardole asks. "If you don't mind my asking."

"Because he'd keep one of us in line by threatening the other," Missy says. "The first time he hit me, I hit him right back, obviously. The next day, Theo had a black eye."

"We couldn't fight back without the other getting hurt," Theo explains. "So we were stuck."

"Why did you stay?" Bill asks, quietly. "If it was that bad, why stay?"

"Don't ask that," Jack interrupts, voice hard. "Never ask someone that. It only shows you have no idea what those kind of relationships are like."

"You're right, I don't, that's why I'm asking," Bill says defensively.

"We were in the middle of a tour, for a start," Theo says, preventing the exchange from going further. "And even after that, we-"

"We loved him," Missy interrupts. She lets out an odd, humourless laugh. "You think it's easy? You think he didn't apologise every time, make excuses? He bought me pretty presents, expensive jewellery, took me on shopping sprees. And he was the only one who would ever understand me."

Her voice is so unbelievably bitter, her face twisted with pain and loathing.

"How could I leave?" she says softly. "How could I go back to feeling like there was something wrong with me, like the dark side he brought out was something I had to hide? How could I throw it all back in his face after everything? No one would understand, not even Thete. No one would ever understand-"

She takes a deep breath, trying to compose herself, her knuckles white where one hand is clutching the back of River's seat.

"I knew she wouldn't leave him," Theo explains. "I couldn't leave her alone with him. Because that was the other thing. We both thought we were getting the worst of it."

"What do you mean?" Clara asks, looking a bit green. Ashildr is holding her hand tightly, their face impassive.

"Well, it wasn't exactly all fine and dandy to see each other in pain, was it?" Theo asks sarcastically. "It didn't help anything. So we did our best to hide the worst of it, because it hurt too much to see. And so we both thought we were taking the worst of it, so the other didn't have to."

"Because even then we were underestimating him, how absolutely wretched he was," Missy adds. She shuts her eyes for a moment. "How wretched he is. He was able to get away with whatever he liked. He hurt us in every possible way you can hurt another person, and all I can remember thinking is at least Thete doesn't have to go through this."

"It was when we realised that we were wrong, that we'd both been taking all of it the whole time, that it had been for nothing, that we finally started to see clearly," Theo says. "It still took us a few months after that, and it wasn't final until-"

Missy gives him a sharp look and he goes quiet.

"Well, it doesn't matter what the final straw was," Theo mutters. "Just that there was one."

"We got out," Missy finishes. "It took several years, but we got out. And then, big shocker, after holding it together for a year or so, miraculously, the emotional trauma led to my infamous cocaine bender. And then rehab. I got out, did a bit better, relapsed, and then finally got better, for reals. I dealt with my shit, essentially."

She looks at Theo, who is now avoiding her gaze.

"Meanwhile, guess who has been repressing his emotions and trauma for the last eighteen and a half years!" she remarks. "Until today. Funny, how bottling that up wasn't healthy."

Theo winces visibly. He's shaking again.

"Leave him alone," River snaps at Missy. "He didn't have a luxury of going on a cocaine bender like you did, he had responsibilities-"

"Wrong, he had to go off to Greece and meet you and fall ass over heels while I was in rehab," Missy retorts. "It's fine, though, it's not like I could have used my best friend for support or anything-"

Theo winces again. "I'm sorry-"

"Don't apologise, Theo, you didn't do anything wrong," River says fiercely. "You did what you had to in order to keep your sanity."

"Can we not fight right now?" Bill asks, feeling tears in her eyes, not knowing how long they've been there. Her whole chest aches. She hates the images and scenes playing in her mind, of her own creation, built from the words spun to her. "After everything you just told us, can we just… not?"

Clara is frozen. She looks like she's going to be sick.

"I'm so sorry I hit you," she says to Missy, numbly. "I-"

"Had no idea, and no way of knowing," Missy replies. "Don't worry about it, Ozzie. I provoked you, I was being a Class A Bitch."

"Still not an excuse to hit someone, is it?"

"No, it isn't. But now you know."

"I'm so sorry I let him get past me," Jack says, eyes shining with guilt. "That bodyguard was distracting me with a bunch of flirting and we were so sure he wasn't here yet, and he had the disguise even if it was kinda crappy in retrospect-"

"It's alright, Jack," Theo tells him. "He'd have found a way in one way or another, I'm sure."

"Next time I see him, I'm going to kill him," Bill says, voice shaking. "Maybe not actual murder, but I am absolutely going to pummel him into the ground."

"And I'll help," River says.

"Me too," Missy adds.

Jack sits up a bit straighter. "And me."

Bill gets up and pulls Missy into a fierce hug, and Missy hugs her back with a crushing strength that Bill sometimes forgets she has.

"Thank you for telling us," Bill says. "I know it can't have been easy."

"I was too proud before," Missy replies. "I'm not now. Not when he's threatening my family."

As they pull away, Bill sees Clara and Jack and Nardole are meanwhile hugging Theo tightly. He looks to be entirely overwhelmed, tears in his eyes as he hugs them all back. Watching it all is River, who is strangely quiet.

"What's that look for, Song?" Missy asks her.

"You owe one more person this story," River says, without quite looking at her. "I know you don't want to, I know it's the last thing you could possibly-"

"Don't overstep yourself," Missy says, voice colder than Bill has heard it in a while. "That is not your business. And neither is who I tell about my trauma."

"I know, but-"

"No buts."

River falls silent and goes back to tearing her napkin.

Theo looks between them, a pained look in his eyes, conflict in his brow. He opens his mouth to say something, but Missy lifts up her hand.

"Not today, Thete," she says firmly. "We're not talking about this today."

"Okay," he replies, in that patient, achingly understanding way of his. "I need to be alone for a bit. Gonna lock my door."

"Okay. Take as long as you need."

Bill hugs him before he goes. "You're so strong I can't even believe it," she tells him softly. "And I know it's hard for me to understand but I just want you to know that you can talk to me, and I'll try my hardest, okay? I'm here."

"I know," he says into her neck. "I know."

With that he lets go of her, and locks himself in his room. Missy, after a moment's thought, goes and does the same with her own, except Bill can see her getting her phone out of her pocket. Probably going to call whoever it is that she calls.

Who is it that she calls? Do they have anything to do with this? Or are they comforting for her because they're the only thing removed from all this?

Bill had wanted answers, and now she has some and almost wishes she didn't. Except, there's still these other questions left, and Bill can only hope to god that the answers aren't as dismal as the rest.

Thanks for reading! I know this is really heavy, but when I had my doubts about this backstory I rewatched The Doctor Falls, and was entirely reassured. Because honestly, if you watch it and remove the context of Missy and Simm!Master being the same person, he seems every bit the abusive ex, especially with how strangely quiet she is around him, how clearly terrified in her own way.

These things are unfortunately a lot more common than we'd like to think, and I think acknowledgement of that is important.

In summary: Theo and Missy, before and during the time they were in The Renegades with Saxon, were in a romantic relationship with him. Saxon eventually and gradually became abusive to Theo and Missy in every possible way (something that has stuck with Missy even now is how he "is the only one who will ever understand her"). Theo and Missy eventually breaking out of the relationship seems to be what broke up the band.